Crime Control and Prevention District - Regular Meeting

Okay, it's 11 after 10. We call to order the CCPD Board of Directors meeting for Friday, August 21st. And first item of business is a consideration of FY27 recommended CCPD budget. Keith Morris.

Keith Morris, Assistant Director of Police. I have a few follow-up slides that I sent through based on some of the conversation that we had. I think we do have queued up behind that the other slides if we need to get into them. So I'll share a little bit this morning and then here for any questions that you may have. So this is a simplified version. There's so much in CCPD, over 50 programs, and they each have a very unique identity. So it's always a challenge how to divide it out. And so we tried to go simple on this just to kind of show you the overall changes between 26 and 27 with the total increased expenses of 8.1 million. the increase in revenue of six million, and then we have a planned use of fund balance of 2.1. And so that's kind of how all the numbers shake out what we presented on Tuesday between all of the programs. Also in here is kind of a simplified detail of the staffing changes. Those are just the affected programs and the 26 numbers and the 27 numbers and kind of how they changed. some changing between programs to staff up programs like bike patrol and move some positions over from general fund for the community alliance commands, some of the expiring grant positions, that kind of thing, and additional positions that are listed in there as well. The other slides that I provided, sent through yesterday, hopefully you got them, provides a summary of the changes for each program. And so with that, I'll open up to any questions because there's lots of different programs. There may be a lot of different questions. Elizabeth, go ahead.

Yeah, one question about the decrease in the one-person decrease in the CIT team.

Yes, that's a sergeant that we moved over to the Stockyards Bike Patrol team.

Okay. Okay. Just a point of clarification, Keith. Cover for us what reductions you have as it impacts crime prevention specialists.

So the crime prevention specialist program, so we went through the reductions, the one in the 3% reductions across the board. We did it in CCPD as well. So all of the department was going through the same reductions. And so we identified some reductions in each program. I believe in the crime prevention specialist program, we had some reductions in operating supplies and some of the signs. They still left some in there, but the deputy chiefs reviewed each of the units underneath their command to look at reductions in the individual programs. So rather than cutting large programs, it was a little bit of cut to individual programs.

All right, any questions by board members? Charlie. Thank you, Keith. I know Chief Garcia and I, we've had good conversations regarding the constitutional policing and I think the really good things that will come from that, especially driven from data and not just emotion. And part of that conversation was regarding partners with the shared mission as well and really evaluating those partners and make sure that we have the right ones in place. So I don't know if Chief Garcia just put you on the spot just so others can hear it since it was great information just telling us about what you're Your plan is there in your outlook.

Yes, Councilmember, thanks for the question. I think I alluded to it on Tuesday. When we look at our partners and our partnerships, we've really taken a look through a criminological lens at the programs that we're providing. Obviously, as we've said before, and as we've talked about with budgets, I mean, particularly in these times as well, being good stewards of our CCPD dollars, we have to ensure that we have programs that aren't just nice to have, but actually have shown that they do have an impact on what we're trying to accomplish with CCPD, which is reduction of crime, prevention of crime, and better public safety. And so by looking through a criminological lens, we're gonna be able to see what programs actually have shown, if there's literature, if there's things around the country, working with criminologists to show that they have worked. In addition to that, what programs, what metrics do we need to grade these programs? Are they offering in a year-to-year basis what you promised that you would offer? So if we're going to fund you, then we hope that what you promised we're going to have is showing its worth. And so I think it's something that looking through it through a criminological lens is we're being data-driven and looking at the programs that we have, really truly just looking at it and saying, okay, what programs are nice and what programs have shown evidence that they work? And obviously that's going to help in our selection process and as we go through our process. you know, through that program.

Thank you, Chief. Thank you. Any other questions? All right. I have one general one, Keith. As far as, you know, we start off, you know, in CCPD funding, you know, some pilot programs. Then, you know, at times we shift over to grant, you know, funding and all that. Can you cover what programs have shifted from pilot to grant?

from pilot to grant funding. So our goal is always to maximize the resources that are available to us and bringing in grants. So COPS hiring is certainly an example of that. So whether you're talking about police programs or nonprofit programs, we're structured really to be looking for effective programs that we can formalize. And so some programs that come into CCPD partners, for example, pilot programs that are getting off the ground that they're evaluating themselves. We're evaluating them to move towards, you know, potentially more permanent funding. Yeah.

I see chief Garcia shadowing you back there. I don't know if he has something.

No, I was just going to say also, as we go through this process, nothing's going to be a surprise to any of you. I mean, I plan on meeting with each one of you one-on-one individually. Let us know where we're at in the process when it, as it pertains to those programming and some of the other programs we've talked about as well through the year.

Right. I guess my point is that we're not necessarily loading the CCPD budget. There are opportunities where we can shift over to grant funding.

Wherever we can without doing any supplanting. So the unique circumstance is something that we work through, but we do try to maximize funding in all of the different resources that we have at our disposal. Got it. Okay. Thank you.

Michael, we have one question from Michael.

This may be for the Chief. We received, is Mr. Haddari here? It sounds like he wanted to submit comments and then wanted to maybe speak in the public, but it doesn't look like he's here. He raised some questions here, Chief, just about some of our ALPR license plate readers. as part of that. I wonder, and I know that FLOC has come out with some suggestions and things. Do you mind speaking about what we're doing? I know you're gonna give us a full presentation at some point, but I think since this was raised in the context of our budget and what we're spending on this technology, a fair chance to answer what we're doing already here in Fort Worth.

Yes, Councilmember, and thank you for the question. As this conversation's come up, obviously we've been working diligently with our Constitutional Policing Unit. Obviously, we didn't start, when I finished this, we didn't start thinking about this on Tuesday. Obviously, one of the things the Constitutional Policing Unit does, and particularly with the help of our Real-Time Crime Center and the hardworking individuals that work there, that really rely on this technology in starting there. One of the jobs that they do is not look at only internal things that are going on with the department, what national issues are we gonna have to deal with? And sure enough, case in point, here we are. You know, before I start, one of the things that I'd like to say from a technology perspective is you have to be responsible with it. There's no question about it. You know, back when I started in the early 90s, was really within the last few years of that, was the advent of having what's called MDTs in your patrol car. And with an MDT in your patrol car, you have access to all CJIS information, right? That's very regulated. You have to get certified, et cetera, et cetera. There's criminal culpability for its misuse as well as administrative. But with that tool that I had in the early 90s, obviously you can run license plates, which cars are stolen, who has warrants, who has suspended driver's license, where is a gun registered to, does someone have an emergency protective order against them, et cetera. Arguably to me, that's the most valuable tool that I think one of the most valuable tools law enforcement has is the ability of officers to do that at their fingertips. Now, if an officer does something wrong and inappropriate. In my opinion, you certainly don't throw the system away that is the most beneficial system to law enforcement at that time. You deal with that particular officer and you also set things in stone to make sure that you respect that tool and make sure that we're operating in a way that has guardrails. Now, when I look at Flock and ALPR, and listen, I've been doing this job for over three decades, and I remember life as a police officer without this technology. And oftentimes I marvel with a smile as to the benefits that this generation of police officer has with this technology to deliver the services that our residents and our victims want as quickly as possible. You know, we saw the reduction in violent crime that we had when we did this presentation on Tuesday. Not only is that because of the hard work of the men and women of this police department, but in fact, because of the technology that we have, that does include flock and that does include ALPR. Now, I've seen a lot of conversations with chiefs around the country about the arguments about keeping flock and how flock's great. There's not a chief in this country, myself included, that's not going to tell you how invaluable it is to have this technology with us. The one part that I think I may differ is the fact that that's not where the discussion ends. You don't have to take the line from Spider-Man, but with great power comes great responsibility. And I do think, and I do, as being in this job for a very long time and a police chief since 2016, I will tell you that we need more guardrails with these type of instruments, even though, again, we do not want to go back to the dark ages of law enforcement without these tools. And so as we look at these things, we started working on a work plan. And I think you may recall, actually, when Dr. Del Carmen actually first gave us our conversation on the Constitutional Policing Unit, he did mention flock in those conversations. And so right now we're developing a scope, right? Where we're gonna develop a structured process for its overall use, the inventory and the deployment, document and evaluating the hit to dispatch decision. And what that means is when our RTCC gets a hit, how that is communicated and vetted for our officers to take action. We're drafting and implementing a misuse detection audit system and mechanism. We're going to ensure that the governing policy is precise regarding authorized and prohibited use. We're going to analyze historical data to help determine the program's efficiency. You know, the overall use will be composed of who has access to FLOC and LPR and the reasons for those requests. Standardizing the query standards, case number, offense type, documented justification, etc. the training and the annual recertification for continued access. And this was interesting to me because the other day I had to recertify in my CEGIS, right, that we have to do every single year. And I'll get into the penalties of misuse of CEGIS in a little bit. But as I was going through that, I thought to myself, policy always lags behind technology. It always does. It has for the entire time I've been a cop. And as I look through that with the conversations we're having, I'm like, why doesn't this type of recertification work for a tool such as FLOC and ALPR so that we are recertifying officers every single year? So we're going to be starting to do that. Obviously, training, data retention, preservation, and sharing guidelines. We're going to ensure the current camera inventory and the footprint is continually updated and accurate. We want to evaluate deployment decision strategies and the overall process, looking at crime rates, looking at crime type. As I mentioned before, if you look at our crime rates here in the city and the massive reductions that we're having is due in part because of this technology. Classify our deployments. What areas are we deploying that they're high crime placement? What areas are we deploying for corridor perimeter placement? What areas are placement based on supportive crime data? You know, our hit to dispatch decision, as I mentioned earlier, we want to examine the process and the steps of events from a hit to determining the appropriate response. We want to set protocols up for user hits and dispatch hits, meaning when an officer uses the system to get a hit as opposed to when the RTCC gets a hit. We want to examine data to measure the response and the outcome results. When we look about misuse detection audit, with an automated and continuous system that alerts the system administrator to potential misuse, FLOC currently has a system based on algorithms and search criteria, and they provide daily feedback. We want to develop a manual process for random sampling as well, not too dissimilar to random sampling of body-worn camera footage and a myriad of other things that we use. Right now, when you look at the governing policies, this is something that, again, I may differ. There is no comprehensive Texas ALPR slash flock statute. Department policy is therefore the only consistent access to its use in how you hold individuals accountable. I'll say that the misuse of flock or ALPR should carry similar penalties, both administratively and criminally, as to see just violations. And I know I've spoken to the city attorney's office with regards to, but we're going to need, I'll be the first chief to testify in Austin to say that that is necessary. I see no reason why misuse of flock and ALPR is not in the same category of misusing sieges. We're going to rework our current Fort Worth PD ALPR general order to ensure policies and procedures are appropriate. And we'll utilize crime data to evaluate the effectiveness and productivity of each device related to the deployment locations. Working through this, and I know we're going to give a March broader presentation to council, I hope we can all stipulate the fact of the amount of lives and how our victims have gotten justice by the use of this technology. But we will have many, many examples as to how this system has given victims justice and how these systems have reduced violent crime in our city. while at the same time understanding the responsibilities of a professional police department to ensure that we have guardrails. So again, I know this is not the presentation. We will have a much more robust presentation, but I thank you for the question. because I don't want council to think that we just began thinking of these issues Tuesday. We've been thinking of them for a while. Simply, it is a tool that no police department in this country has the luxury of losing. We have to, similar as I tell my rank and file with regards to the trust and the support we get from this city, we need to treat that as a precious gift. In a system such as this, it is as powerful such as this that can help us and has helped us solve numerous amount of crimes we need to treat in the same vein.

Thank you. Thanks for that mini presentation and the bigger presentation that we might have. I think we can all probably find examples in the district where the technology has, as you said, served justice in some way, shape, or form. I can think of Las Vegas Trail, I can think of Como, but I'm sure we all can come up with examples as part of that too. I'm glad to hear you're already thinking about how this technology to keep it safe and keep, we hear horror stories of what's happening that maybe officers might be accessing it to find girlfriends or ex-girlfriends, things like that. And so I'm glad you're already looking at that to make sure that's not happening here in Fort Worth and also being willing to speak up to it at a legislative sense to make sure it's not happening statewide.

I'll say this, Councilmember. The reality of it is, you know, if there's abuses to systems, we need to deal with them harshly, particularly systems such as this, and ensure, and harshly is the wrong word, probably, but severely, to understand how important this is to our community, how important this is to the rank and files. For every misuse that there is, you're putting in jeopardy the amazing work that men and women are using with this technology every single day to reduce violent crime in our city and to protect victims. It's simply a tool we cannot lose.

I will say this, just to kind of wrap this up a little bit, and Chris, I'll call on you here, that the U.S. law does not recognize an absolute right to privacy in public spaces. And as baseline, the Fourth Amendment governs that. Chris, you had a question?

No, I don't have a question. I just want to add to what you're going to bring back as a presentation. I listened to the things that you're putting in place, and you talked about the successes of FLOT. I also want to see in that recommendation, or not recommendation, but presentation, is where we have had missteps in the FLOT camera. If there is any procedure where we have abuse in Fort Worth Police Department, as well as nationally, so we can actually look at both sides of when we actually have the conversation.

I'll say this, Councilmember, I won't be able to speak nationally without speaking specifically to individual chiefs other than reading media, but I can certainly go into what we've seen since we've been using the tool.

Okay. Well, maybe legal can do some study of what's happened around the world.

Maybe your request, too, since this is coming back, I've had the opportunity several times to see our real-time crime center in person. And if that has not been offered to every council member, please do that and let them see it their own schedule to see it in person, ask their questions prior to a presentation, because I think it would help a bit. And also have a more informed question and answer session with chief and command staff, so thank you.

We'll have the team ready, Mayor. Awesome.

Great, thank you, Chief. Thank you. All right. I know we have pending action on this, but do we have any speakers present that we need?

We have registered speakers. I'd like to call them. I don't believe either one is present. Our first registered speaker is Antoine Joseph Haddari. Mr. Haddari here. And then the other individual who signed up to speak is Ryan Almusabi. And then also just for the record, there were written comments that were submitted. They were distributed to the board and also handed out this morning. They'll be on file. Yes, I believe the board members did receive it.

Council Member Flores, just a comment before we vote on the budget. I just want to compliment Keith and your team. You work very hard behind the scenes and sometimes we ask the tough questions on the fly. And so I just thought it was necessary for us to thank you all for your hard work, working with PD and the rest of the team.

Thank you, Mayor. They've been doing some deep diving on those numbers. It is appreciated. All right. Chris, I know that you had, I think, you know, had some questions, some follow-up questions. The mayor suggested that maybe we do some things, avail ourselves of, you know, some information prior to that. But are there any future agenda items?

We do need action upon the budget. Oh, sorry. Public hearing. All right.

Do I have a first on the budget? Okay. First and a second. All in favor indicate by saying aye.

Aye.

All right. Any nays? Seeing none, that passes. Now, future agenda items. Anybody?

I mean, that's what I asked was a fuse agenda item, yeah.

All right, that's been noted. Staff, we clear on that? On that request? Okay, good. All right, if there's no other business, we're adjourned at 10.32.